A family of computer programs is being designed to compute the survival value of procedures currently used to stage patients with Hodgkin's disease, and to determine an optimal chronological sequence of these staging procedures for any given patient. These programs, utilizing computational techniques based upon concepts of decision theory, information theory and statistical analysis, will comprise a prototype for a computer-based information system that can be used for any human malignancy for which correlation of clinical findings with tumor extent are known and for which significant benefit is available from therapy determined by extent of tumor.